Universities

Reject the £900 pay rise – we can win more

End the marketised fee-based funding system

Bea Gardner, UCU member

The University and College Union (UCU)’s message to Keir Starmer on the eve of the Labour Party conference was “tax big business to fund British universities”.

The big question facing the union, however, is what kind of campaign and strategy is needed to achieve it?

The university sector is facing a major funding crisis, which the new government has yet to announce its response to. In the meantime, university bosses have intensified their lobbying for an increase in tuition fees, with Universities UK (UUK) – a bosses’ club for university vice-chancellors – calling for an increase from the current £9,250 to as much as £13,000 a year.

UCU has rightly responded that it should be those “with the deepest pockets” who pay, not students. Instead, it has called for an education levy “to provide universities with much-needed extra funding and end its tuition fee-based system”, all while “still leaving corporation tax below the rate at which Tony Blair set it”.

UCU figures indicate a 4.3% increase would raise £17 billion. That could not only replace the £11 billion in fees English students pay each year with funded teaching grants, but also provide an extra £4.58 billion to the sector. That is the equivalent of an increase in tuition fees to £13,000.

Now the UCU leadership must convert its words into deeds, by launching a serious campaign linking the industrial disputes for jobs, pay and conditions with the political campaign to scrap fees and not only increase funding but win full public funding for universities. Why stop corporation tax at the rate Tony Blair set it?

Workers and students

Such a campaign would be extremely welcome to university workers facing threats of redundancy, and to students facing fee hikes.

Over 70 higher education (HE) institutions are already undergoing redundancy or restructuring programmes. UCU branches have boldly fought back to save jobs, but a nationally coordinated campaign that lays the blame with the current marketised, fee-based funding system would strengthen these disputes.

Such a campaign would also be important for the pay dispute. This week, UCU members in HE will decide the next steps following the flat £900 annual pay award being imposed by the employers – just £75 a month. There is a strong mood that this is not enough, but members do not want to fight for pay if it will come at the cost of jobs.

Members are also questioning what kind of strategy can win on pay, after extensive strike action in recent years has had limited results for UCU members.

A strategy that links the fight against job losses, job insecurity and pay erosion with a political campaign to end the fee-based system and make the super-rich pay would unify university workers and students. It would give confidence that we can win gains in members’ interests.

Control of how funding is spent is also key. Even when university income was growing, the percentage of it spent on staff fell.

UCU should join with other campus unions and student organisations to fight for democratic staff and student control of HE, so it is run in the interests of staff, students and local communities, not the financiers and profiteers.

Further Education

Build for united action on pay

Fight for full public funding

Duncan Moore

UCU NEC member representing FE, personal capacity

The new academic year begins under a new Labour government, after years of neglect and growing crisis under the Tories, who cut spending per student by 14%.

Any hopes in Starmer’s government have been dashed by the announcement that there will be no additional funding for further education (FE) this year, despite growing numbers of students.

UCU’s “New Deal for FE” demands:

• A 10% or £3,000 increase in pay, whichever is greater – as a first step to restore the more than 40% cut in real pay over a decade 
• Close the pay gap between FE and schoolteachers’ pay within three years
• A minimum starting salary of £30,000

And crucially, we need binding national pay bargaining in FE. 

Privatisation in the early 1990s led to a collapse in funding and destroyed national pay bargaining. Lecturers’ pay now stands at £9,000 below that of schoolteachers. 25% of lecturers quit the profession within three years.

What we need is a serious strategy to win UCU’s demands.

The current strategy of the general secretary, president and vice president – using local claims to put pressure on the employers’ body, the Association of Colleges (AoC), and the government – is not working. No pay recommendation has yet been made by the AoC!

National campaign needed

Talks are due on 7 October, by which time many individual branches will have already agreed pay deals with local college bosses. Overwhelmingly, these will likely not be enough, and be below even the 5.5% awarded to schoolteachers – which in itself still does not begin to restore lost pay.

UCU should launch an indicative national ballot of England FE members, asking whether they are willing to take industrial action in support of the union’s pay demands.

Our union also needs a serious political strategy to back up our industrial action. Before the election, instead of placing clear demands on Labour, general secretary Jo Grady said that the shadow cabinet was “engaging positively with the unions” and talked about the potential of “partnership” with Labour.

The announcement of 0% extra funding for FE shows the reality of this pro-capitalist Labour government. We cannot let our members become victims of Starmer’s austerity measures.

Jo Grady expresses “disappointment” with Labour. UCU should appeal to the independent left MPs, including Jeremy Corbyn, and those suspended from Labour, to advance our union’s policies in parliament.